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"Effective Instructional Strategies for a Model Classroom ... The Curriculum Project provides K - 12 educators with training, materials, and software designed to bring about increased levels of student success. Our instructional strategies and emphasis on the implementation of state standards help teachers to refine their practices to provide differentiated experiences for learners of all types."

Project-based learning (PBL) naturally lends itself to differentiated instruction. By design, it is student-centered, student-driven, and gives space for teachers to meet the needs of students in a variety of ways. PBL can allow for effective differentiation in assessment as well as daily management and instruction. PBL experts will tell you this, but I often hear teachers ask for real examples, specifics to help them contextualize what it "looks like" in the classroom. We all need to try out specific ideas and strategies to get our brains working in a different context. Here are some specific differentiation strategies to use during a PBL project.

"Dr. Heidi Hayes Jacobs is an internationally recognized expert in the fields of literacy, curriculum and instruction, and educational reform. In the first part of our interview, Heidi exposes the pitfalls of American literacy instruction and explains what we can do to improve it."

"What is iObservation? iObservation is an instructional and leadership improvement system. It collects, manages and reports longitudinal data from classroom walkthroughs and teacher observations. Teacher growth and leadership practices inform professional development differentiated to individual learning needs for every teacher and leader to increase his/her effectiveness each year."

Loved this quote form the article ... "Primary school students who used them for a year became instructors for teachers who had not used the gadgets before. One prep class actually created an instructional DVD to be used by staff explaining and demonstrating how to operate a (hi-tech) whiteboard," Mr Light said."

"As educators, we give feedback to students on their work all the time: in the moment, daily, weekly, and at the end of a unit or year. And research about formative assessment tells us that feedback is a foundational practice that makes a difference in student learning. But how can we make sure our guidance truly encourages our students' learning and growth at each interval? The literature includes some practical ideas to help us get there. It tells us that there is a continuum of feedback, which starts at one end with a focus on what's right or wrong. At the other end of the continuum, the type and amount of information provided turns the feedback into instruction. Let's take a look at three different feedback models derived from the literature and the insights we can take away from each one."

Tons of ideas and strategies for meeting collaboratively realted to curriculum, instruction, and assessment

"Welcome to Worlds of Words. You will find many useful resources on this site for building bridges between cultures. These resources include multiple strategies for locating and evaluating culturally authentic international children's and adolescent literature as well as ways of engaging students with these books in classrooms and libraries."

"Alfie Kohn writes and speaks widely on human behavior, education, and parenting. The author of eleven books and scores of articles, he lectures at education conferences and universities as well as to parent groups and corporations. Kohn's criticisms of competition and rewards have been widely discussed and debated, and he has been described in Time magazine as "perhaps the country's most outspoken critic of education's fixation on grades [and] test scores.""

"The Khan Academy is a not-for-profit organization with the mission of providing a high quality education to anyone, anywhere. We have 1400+ videos on YouTube covering everything from basic arithmetic and algebra to differential equations, physics, chemistry, biology and finance which have been recorded by Salman Khan."

"Phil Bird's excellent post on using Google Streetview a while back jogged my memory about a lesson I sometimes do with students when the sun is cracking the flags and the classroom gets too hot to want to stay indoors for the full session."

Resources, Web sites, Rubrics

Over a 1000 books on-line in various languages

"But instead, they were having what Katie Slivensky, an educator from the museum, calls a "backwards field trip" in a portable, inflatable planetarium set up for the morning in the old gym at Sutton High School - a 50-minute lesson on the stars, moon and planets, tied to state learning standards for physical science, earth and space."

"These games were created in PowerPoint. Download the templates and modify the games to fit your curriculum needs."

"After six years of study, a national panel of prominent scholars has concluded that there's not enough evidence to suggest that teachers who take alternative pathways into the classroom are any worse­-or any better­-than those who finish traditional college-based preparation programs."

"Texting can be a teaching tool. That's what some believe. So, for subjects ranging from Spanish to science, from homework help to exam reminders, teachers around the country are beginning to allow students to text in class."

"Electronic textbooks are closer to becoming a reality in Texas classrooms. Already, many are picturing classrooms where textbooks exist on the Internet or on Kindle-like devices."

"This site was created by Dr. Alice Christie to share an exciting new approach to teaching and learning. Enabled by Web 2.0 tools, GoogleTreks™ allows teachers and students to synthesize information in one easy-to-use map that places text, pictures, audio files, video files, and much more in one central location."